Veterans Of Serenity
by jackwabbit
Summary: Zoë/Mal/River Friendship, Indirectly Heavy On The Zoë/Mal Part. Spoilers: Out Of Gas. Summary: What Happened In Shuttle Two To Turn It Back To Serenity? Note: This Fic Utilizes Information From The Deleted Scenes On Series Disc Four.


**Veterans Of Serenity**

Rated: PG

Category: Zoë/Mal/River Friendship, Heavy On The Zoë/Mal Part. Wash and Simon Support.  
Spoilers: Out Of Gas  
Summary: What Happened In Shuttle Two To Turn It Back To _Serenity_?

Note: This Fic Utilizes Information From The Deleted Scenes On Series Disc Four.

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Zoë came to slowly, and it took her a while to realize she was in one of _Serenity's_ shuttles.

When she did, only one question came to mind.

"Why?"

Simon appeared instantly in response to the garbled word, and Wash looked over his shoulder.

"Everything's going to be fine. Just relax," said Simon.

Wash swapped places with the young doctor. He reached out and caught Zoë's hand between both of his as he murmured his own small comforts.

"You scared me. Glad you're back with us."

Zoë blinked once, still a little groggy. Then she blinked again, and all traces of unconsciousness were wiped from her eyes and her mind. When she next spoke, she meant business.

"Why are we in this shuttle?"

Wash opened his mouth to speak, but Simon's answer was faster.

"Don't worry about that right now. Just concentrate on getting better. I'm still not completely sure why you were unconscious for as long as you were, so…"

Wash nodded in enthusiastic agreement. He really didn't want to fill his wife in on the details of the last few hours just now if he could help it.

Zoë narrowed her eyes, and a voice she hadn't used much since Hera barked out her next statement.

"Gentlemen, I'm only going to ask you this once. What the hell happened?"

Wash looked at Simon, and the surgeon nearly shrugged back. They had no choice but to tell Zoë the entire story, and they knew it. There was no way she'd let up on them until they did. So, after a very large sigh, Wash began a tale of fires and synchronizers and life support failures and shuttles. Simon filled in where Wash faltered, but together they got through the story soon enough.

It didn't take long.

When the men were done, Zoë nodded thoughtfully.

"And you actually left him," confirmed Zoë.

"He didn't give us much choice," said Simon, as Wash nodded sadly.

"There's always a choice," interjected River, who took this extremely unhelpful time to enter the conversation.

Simon and Wash glared at the girl, who was grinning ear to ear and nearly skipping into the main shuttle compartment from the cockpit, but Zoë merely smiled.

"Little moonbrain ain't often right, but when she is, she makes good sense. You had a choice. Not a very good one, but you had one. And we've got one now. Turn the ship around."

"What?" Wash and Simon spoke in unison.

Zoë didn't bother to repeat her command. Instead, she merely clarified it.

"Now."

"Zoë, baby, we can't go back now. Even if we did…" Wash didn't finish. He didn't need to. Everyone could do the math for themselves. Mal would be out of oxygen before they returned.

Zoë suddenly sat up in her makeshift bunk. She didn't flinch or react to her movements in any way, despite the pain that was burning through her insides. Neither Wash nor Simon moved to help her, and she was grateful. She only needed one kind of help right now; the kind that turned the ship around.

"Then we'll go back for his body."

"Why? So we can all die, too? I know it's an old soldier thing to 'never leave a man behind', Zoë, but this is ridiculous!" Wash's voice rose in volume and pitch, and Simon politely put some distance between himself and the warring couple. This was becoming a far more personal fight than he was comfortable being involved with.

Zoë chewed on her lip for a half second before she responded.

"Hoban Washburne, you and I both know that we're just as dead out here as we are back there. This shuttle ain't gonna get us to anywhere where we can be saved. And I don't know about you, but I'd rather die tryin to do the right thing than just tryin to stretch a few more minutes from this verse. Turn the ship around."

Wash swallowed once, but he never got a chance to respond to his wife's words.

River did it for him.

"He doesn't have to."

Simon gaped at his sister. "What do you mean?"

"He ain't the only one can fly this thing, and us womenfolk gotta stick together. I turned us around the first time she asked."

Wash was in the cockpit before River had finished speaking. Simon was hot on his heels.

"She's right," admitted Wash. "She did it. Complete reverse trajectory. We're headed back to _Serenity_."

"Guess that settles it," mumbled Simon.

Wash sighed. "Well, I could turn us back around, but to be honest, Zoë's right. We're not going anywhere out here, and I'd rather spend my last hours with a happy wife than a homicidal one."

Simon grinned in a morbid way.

"And I'd just as soon not have to patch the both of you up from the fighting, so…"

Wash snorted a small laugh. "So back it is."

Simon nodded, and he and Wash headed back into the main shuttle compartment after Wash triple checked the autopilot. The men got so caught up in trying to decide where River had gleaned her latest skill that they hardly noticed when the girl sidled up next to Zoë for a moment. Zoë was re-situating herself in her bunk on the floor when she noticed River trying to help her.

"I got it, River. But thanks. For everything."

"It weren't nothin," said River, in an admirable impression of Mal.

Zoë smiled, then sobered, wondering how much of her action River truly understood. "It was, but that's beside the point right now. You do know we might die out here, right, little one?"

River smiled and leaned in to whisper in Zoë's ear. "Folks should die where they lived."

Zoë's brow furrowed in confusion. "There's no way we can make it to Osiris."

River smiled patiently and whispered into Zoë's ear again. "_Once you've been in Serenity, you never leave. You just learn to live there_."

Zoë's eyes widened at hearing her own words, said to Simon what seemed like a lifetime ago, come back to her, and River stepped far enough away to let Zoë see her wink before she turned away.

It was then that Zoë knew that River understood things more clearly than half the so-called sane folks on the boat. And she would've said so, but her injuries abruptly caught up with her and she was forced to lay completely down. She'd meant for it to only be for a minute, but her body had other ideas.

As Zoë drifted back into the not-so-restful sleep of the badly injured, she grinned. She didn't know what they'd find when they returned to _Serenity_, but as River's words echoed in her mind, she could think of only one response to them that made any kind of sense to her at all.

'_Once you've been in Serenity, you never leave. You just learn to live there_.'

'Damn right,' thought Zoë.

She knew that if there was a way to survive on that ship, Mal would find it. Her last coherent thought before sleep claimed her was sent to the black…

'Hold on, Sarge. We're coming for ya. We're coming.'


End file.
